Patients having respiratory and/or pulmonary difficulties have in the past relied upon oxygen tanks for providing their pure oxygen gas requirements. This type of oxygen supply is expensive to maintain and, with the large amount of compressed pure oxygen contained in the supply tank, possesses a potential hazzard for the homeowner. Recently oxygen concentrators have provided an alternate source of oxygen and are increasing replacing the oxygen tank as the primary source of patient oxygen.
An oxygen concentrator utilizies a compressor to pressurize and alternately force atmospheric air through two sieve beds. The sieve beds contain a solid compound which extracts nitrogen from the atmospheric air thereby increasing the oxygen gas concentration in the remaining atmospheric gas thus providing an almost pure flow of oxygen gas to the patient. An electronically controlled valve matrix directs the alternate flow of pressurized atmospheric air into and out of the sieve beds and further controls the delivery of pure oxygen gas to the patient.
The advantages of utilizing oxygen concentrators over conventional tank supplied oxygen are numerous and include lower oxygen delivery cost and the elimination of a large amount of compressed pure oxygen stored in heavy tanks in the home. However, the disadvantages include the occassional malfunction of mechanical components including the compressor and valve matrix and the normally slow deterioration of the sieve beds which eventually decreases the oxygen concentration to an unacceptable level. Sieve bed deterioration is accelerated if a valve malfunction is not timely corrected by the health care provider.
Most oxygen concentrators provide a means of monitoring machine performance which, upon detecting a machine malfunction, activates an audible alarm to alert the patient. The patient must then alert the health care provider of the machine malfunction. This places an additional burden on the patient and family. Further, many oxygen concentrators are not located near the patient because of the noise level of the compressor and therefore an activated alarm may not be heard. Remote monitoring of machine performance would eliminate many of these disadvantages.
Health care providers and manufacturers have both recognized the many advantages of remote monitoring oxygen concentrator performance and a number of patents have been issued in this area. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,627,860 issued to Rowland describes an oxygen concentrator which includes a microprocessor and a cooperating means for monitoring the performance of various components of the concentrator. An external apparatus may then be either directly connected or remotely connected through a telephonic communication link to the concentrator to monitor concentrator operation. Although capable of remote monitoring the operation of the concentrator, the external apparatus can only be used with a cooperating concentrator specifically designed to interface with the external apparatus and is not universally adaptable to other concentrators.
Most health care providers must supply the make of oxygen concentrator as stipulated by the attending physician. This forces each health care provider to inventory as many different makes and models as there are manufacturers of oxygen concentrators. For the health care provider to effectively monitor those oxygen concentrators with remote monitoring ability would require a substantial investment in manpower and equipment to receive the different monitoring signals. Additionally, no standard communication protocol exists among the various makes and models which have remote monitoring capability further increasing the cost of this service. Also many popular brands of oxygen concentrators are not equipped for remote monitoring.
While the foregoing prior art have, with varying degrees of success, attempted to provide oxygen concentrators with remote monitoring capability, none of the prior art discloses a universal and programmable monitoring apparatus which can be easily installed on any make of oxygen concentrator. Thus there remains a need in the art for a simple to install, inexpensive and universal oxygen concentrator remote monitoring apparatus.